The Right Red
by Alicia-Spin
Summary: When Dean Thomas finally finds his muse, what will he have to do to keep her and in the end will he want to? Dean/OC. Please R&R! UPDATED 28-3-09
1. Chapter 1

_~~Part 1~~_

**(The First Meeting)**

Of all the jobs I've taken to pay the rent while I pursued my true love, which is art, this was probably one of the worst. Spending long hours that stretched into the night at an empty bar was never my aspiration. And now here I was once again stuck all by myself in this dimly light, over priced, monstrosity, while my supposed friends lived it up at the Leaky Cauldron.

Whoever said that a posh hotel needed a posh bar that stayed open until four in the morning was completely wrong. Especially when nobody was ever going to come to the bar after ten. They were in their nice hotel rooms doing not so nice things I barely remembered doing.

_Dean Thomas_, I scolded myself, _you need to get a life. Your almost thirty-five years old and you haven't done anything._

It was easy for me to scoff off this stern reprimand. I gave it to myself almost every night.

I doodled on cocktail napkins for awhile, longing for the blank white canvases in my flat. Of course, they have been white for over two years now, so one more paint-less night probably won't bother them. Alicia says I'm just in a rut and that Seamus is _in _rut. I suppose that the Seamus part was beside the point, but it brought always smile to my face.

The clock struck once and I breathed a sight of relief. Only a few more hours and I could escape to my comfy bed.

Moving out from behind the bar, I sat down on one of the lounge chairs and undid the horrid orange bow tie all employees were made to wear and drifted off into a content sleep, letting the idiotic thing fall to the ground. It seemed like lifetimes had gone by when a faint _tap tap tap_ woke me. Sighing, I looked over my shoulder expecting to be greeted by the unpleasant sight of Martin, the manager of my personal hell.

What my eyes were treated to instead took my breath away.

She looked like a goddess straight from a Greek myth, her flowing purple gown clinging and not clinging in a way that it had to have been made by a man who knew what other men wanted to see and to guess. Her short brown hair had pearls beaded into it, making it sparkle all the more in the dim light. But the thing that really got me about her was her eyes. They had to be the saddest blue eyes I had ever seen, but they also possessed a hardness to them that I only noticed as she walked closer and closer to me.

I stood up quickly and awkwardly, sleep still fogging up half my brain as I tried to remember where I was and more importantly what I was supposing to be doing. But all that flew into the background of my thoughts as she came nearer to me, her scent subtle yet overpowering me completely.

She smell of something that reminded me of innocence summer days and strawberries.

"They have a bar, but no bartender." she said to me with a slight accent, her face tilted upward. She was almost a head shorter then me in four inch stilettos. Some primal part of me wanted to lift her up so I would be the one forced to crane my neck. It seemed improbable that an angel should be the one looking up at someone like me.

I dumbly looked from the bar, where I now remembered I was suppose to be, then back to her, someone I knew definitely wasn't on the same level as me. It wasn't as if I had low self-esteem, I just had a healthy respect for the natural social order of life.

Goddesses do not talk to artistic bartenders.

Thats when I made my decision. For just one night, I would be one her level. It would be that one experience every artist, whether painter or writer, talks about. The one thing that inspired them above all other things. She would be my muse; my haunting dream.

"It's a shame." I replied in an almost bored manner I had heard some clientèle speak in and sat back down on the sofa, making a grand sweeping gesture to the empty spot beside me.

The shadow of a smile crossed her heavenly face before she sat down, crossing at her ankles like a proper lady always does.

"What's your name?" she questioned sweetly.

"Dean... Thomas Dean." I said stupidly, stumbling over my own name, distracted by the light hand on my shoulder.

"And tell me, monsieur Dean, what do you do?"

I paused for a moment, trying to recall other conversations I had heard; Other flirtations between demi-goddesses and the men they choose to go with after ten.

"I do enough to keep me happy and traveling."

"Marvelous," she said, her smile widening so I could memorize each of her perfect white teeth. I thought of the hours I would spend later just perfecting how to draw that captivating mouth. I knew innately that I would never be able to capture her eyes though.

"And you?" I asked eagerly, piling on another question in my attempt to find out everything about this miracle muse, filled with desire to hear her soft voice, which was almost a mummer now. "What are you doing here?"

The sadness seemed to intensify in those sapphire eyes for a moment, before almost disappearing. A silence followed, in which she sat there scanning my face in a way that made me want to admit to every awful thing I'd done.

"It's my birthday." she stated finally, inching closer to me.

"Oh..."

"And all I wanted was a martini."

I tried not to look eager as I casually glanced around the bar and stood up. "It is your lucky day then, martini's are my specialty."

"Really?" Her answer had an almost teasing quality to it, one that made my heart pound in such a way it dented my ribs with every rapid beat.

I nodded, completely enthralled and hoping no one, especially the night manager, who used to be a snotty Ravenclaw, decided to come in and destroy this perfect charade.

Wondering across the room and behind the bar, I tried very hard not to stare at her and act like I didn't know where every glass and bottle was situated. The former was a lot harder then the later. Halfway through adding the finishing touch to her drink, she came up to the bar and sat on the high stool across from my station. She looked at me without smiling or frowning, but curiosity evident in her face.

"How does someone like you know how to make a martini?"

"My house-elf... Seamus isn't always around." I said with a shrug, thinking half-truths sounded more believable then outright lies. And it was true, Seamus wasn't always around. He was always off with the current 'fling-of-the-week'.

Handing her the fragile glass, I leaned on the wooden bar top and waited with with eager anticipation for her reaction. This was perhaps the most important drink I made in my life. She lifted the flute to her lush lips and I gave up trying to not to stare at this point. I noticed that she didn't seem to mind though, as though she was use to being constantly ogled (though I would like to think what my eyes were engaging in was something less demeaning then ogling).

When she finished, she handed me the glass, a faint outline of her lipstick staining the clear glass. I would draw that later too, though it would take me hours to mix the right red.

"Wonderful." was the only praise that left her lips and I felt exalted beyond all measures; I was sure that no man before me, and none after, would ever raise to such heights as my heart did at that moment. If I was acting like myself, I would have beamed, but I had to stay in character for my muse, or else the spell would be broken and she would vanish.

So I gave a small shrug and a roguish grin instead, waving my hand for a second as if to indicate that it was nothing. I didn't have to try to plan my next move, because she opened her mouth to speak once more.

"I think Thomas, that I like you. Your just so.. so.." She took a moment and while she was looking right at me, blue piercing brown, I felt like she was actually miles away. Instinct possessed me to take her soft hands gently in mine, as if some earthly touch would bring her back, and it worked. The small smile that tugged at her lips drew a similar smile from me.

"Thomas?" she asked, her voice soft.

"Yes?"

"Would it be..." my muse paused for a second before continuing, as if weighing an unknown scale in her head, "Would it be imprudent to ask you to kiss me?"

My heart soared and heat rushed through every vein as I gave her a kind smile in return and shook my head. Lifting her hands that I already held up higher, I softly kissed every knuckle, before turning them palm up and laying my lips on each wrist, if only for a few seconds. Looking up from my pursuits, I glanced upon her face to see her reaction.

Soft pink graced her cheeks in a way that cannot be achieved by makeup or magic, but only by being naturally induced. But the thing that really got me was her eyes, because for the first time it seemed like all the hardness went out of them and all that was left was endless blue which drowned me the instant I saw them, paralyzing the very marrow of my bones with their unguarded brilliance.

I would have stayed motionless for entirety, enthralled, had she not bowed her head forward and kissed me. The moment tongue caressed tongue, I swear I felt a faint shift in a faraway place and I knew my heart no longer resided within me.

*******

When I awoke alone, I was almost sure she was a dream. Some illusion my heart created to survive yet another night alone in a bed clearly made for two.

It wasn't until almost a year later, when I realized that my dream girl wasn't a dream. The exact moment I realized this was when I saw her at a party. Her white venetian gown stood out among all the dress robes. Curls, longer now, loosely cascading down her back and her arm around none other then the newly divorced Adrian Pucey.

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**A/N:** Alright everyone, this is the first chapter! I'd love to hear what you all think, so please R&R :) I don't know if the style I'm writing this in fits or not, but I think I'm going to stick with it for awhile. Hope everyone who read it enjoyed it! :) :)

**DEDICATED TO:** This story to dedicated to my beta/sister, Kate7, who requested I do a Dean/OC romance. Hopefully this fulfills her wish!


	2. Bad Ends and Broken Hearts

_~~Part Two~~_

**(Bad Ends and Broken Hearts)**

"Bugger me..." I said, rooted in the spot and staring at my own personal muse, who seemed in a way more real to me now, then she a year ago.

"What is it mate?" Seamus asked, suddenly intrigued.

"It's her."

"Her?" Oliver asked, interjecting himself into what I wished was a private conversation.

"Just a girl." Seamus quickly covered, giving Alicia a look which told her Oliver needed to leave, but not her. Somewhere during fifth and sixth year they had developed this kind of secret code of 'looks', a language they never bothered to teach me. Sometimes it annoyed me when they do it, as I'm sure Oliver is now bothered, but tonight I could care less. Tonight I was otherwise engaged, trying to hear even one single syllable uttered from those ruby lips.

"What girl?" Alicia demanded calmly, after sending Oliver to go get her some more champagne. I had chosen not to regale Alicia with the tale of my muse, for a variety of reasons. The foremost being that after finding George Weasley and Katie Bell in _her _bed, Alicia was in no way a fan of one-night stands.

However, under her determined gaze, Seamus buckled.

"The girl Dean shagged without knowing her name, he calls her the muse." Seamus spouted out quickly, avoiding my aggravated gaze, which I directed at him for a moment before returning it to her. "It's romantic, right?" Seamus added hopefully.

The look on my friends face at this information only reinforced my former decision not to tell her. However, after a moment, I heard a sigh rarely heard from Alicia. One that sounded like a trumpet of surrender. I breathed a sigh of relief internally about not having to deal with her thoughtful and well-intentioned nagging on the subject.

"Which one?"

Seamus grinned and quickly pointed my muse out, knowing her by sight from many drawings I kept hidden from everyone but him.

"Oh. Her." Her tone indicated bored familiarity.

I swerved my head, looking at Alicia fully now, barely able to contain the excitement in my voice. "Do you know her?"

"Well, yeah. She looks a little different, but she graduated with my younger brother from Hogwarts. I think they even dated for like two seconds."

"Her name?"

"Claire Harper."

The name rang in my ears like the choir of a thousand of my muses sister angels. Many times I had imagined names, but now that I knew, none seemed as perfect as the actual reality.

It took my love-addled brain only one second to figure out how Claire Thomas sounded.

"She is a total bird, mate."

Alicia and I shot Seamus a disgusted look. Alicia for reasons that I was not suppose to know about occurring almost ten years ago and I because I was protective of Claire; Seamus could find his own muse, he certainly had enough women who would be willing.

"Are you two idiots forgetting a crucial detail."

Both of us looked towards Alicia confused.

"She is with Adrian and from that diamond on her finger, I would dare to venture she is going to be the next lady of Pucey manor."

I zeroed in on the ring in question and felt my world shaken to the core. I tried to think of a million explainations for the ring, for their intimate stance. But nothing could compete with what was obviously the truth; my Claire was marrying such a Slytherin. I felt like puking and screaming and crying all at once.

"Dean..." I could barely hear Alicia's worried voice through the ringing erupted in my ears. Because at that moment, blue eyes met my own brown in widened surprise.

It was as if the world stopped in that moment of mutual recognition. Breathing slowed, the earth froze in its rotation. Dust the hung in the air sparkled in frozen animation. Then everything rushed back into normal time out of the second of nirvana I experienced. Before I was able to properly adjust to the shift, she was gone. I didn't need to crane my neck to see over the crowd, but I did anyway. There was Pucey, but no muse.

I quickly left the side of my protesting friends, venturing outside. As I passed Pucey on my way to the balcony, I tried not to look at him, tried not to think that maybe we both had shared in something so magnificent, so life altering. She was the reason I was drawing again, the reason there was never enough paper or canvas to satisfy my creativity.

So into the cool night air I went, the stars my only guides to the ultimate objective; my search for the love of my life. After a few moments of searching, I saw her, secluded away from the house, the moon spotlighting her against the dark night as if it shined only for her.

Her back was to me as I approached, but I had a feeling that she knew I was there.

"You know there is no bartender out here." I said, trying to recapture that perfect night in all its glory.

"Who needs one on a night like this?" she asked, the lilt in her voice sending my heart fluttering into the distant heavens above. "How can the taste of drinks compare to the complete brilliance of the stars."

"And how can even the stars compete with you?"

Still, she didn't turn to face me. There was no smiles and easy laughs as there was last time. But, for me, the awe remained; the complete fascination that hallmarks the love sick.

"Do you really believe that Thomas?"

"With all my heart Claire Harper." I said without a moment of hesitation.

At the sound of her name she whirled around to face me, her eyes wide as a deer caught in a trap, but again there was that hardness, and a certain amount of fury as well shown clearly.

"What did you just call me?" she demanded and it seemed at that moment she towered over me, though the obvious height difference made it physically impossible for her to.

"Claire?" I said, wondering if Alicia was wrong; wondering a thousand things.

"You mustn't call me that ever again." she whispered, the fear evident in her voice freezing me in ways not even the coldest winter could. But before I could hold her in my arms and tell her whatever it was would be okay; before I could protect her from whatever made her sound like that, the last person I ever wanted to see decided to join us.

"Clara?"

Though Pucey was older, his voice was still the same as I remembered it being at school, smug and calculating. His green dress robes were tailored perfectly, making my generic ones seem to itch in mere proximity to his. I was acutely aware at that moment how inferior it was, how far I was actually trying to reach to be with my muse.

"Darling." Claire said, moving over to Pucey's side with all the elegance in the world. I had never guessed a simple seven letter word could ever break my heart. Together they looked like royalty, all proper and regal as they stood there together, hands intertwined.

Pucey gave her a dismissive look before returning his cold gaze to me. "Dean Thomas, it hasn't been long enough."

A hateful rebuke longed to exit my throat and become words, but I was too transfixed on the utter look of confusion my muses face as her gaze wandered from me to Pucey and back again. It wasn't as if I would have kept up the charade forever, but I didn't want her to find out about me from a Slytherin's perspective.

"How on earth did you get invited to this party?" he inquired sternly.

I felt heat flood my cheeks as I looked down at the green grass, my fist clenched to my side. "Oliver Wood had a few extra invitations."

"Of course, your friends with his little sl..."

"Adrian." Claire interjected before the word could leave his lips, saving him from a broken nose I would gladly have given him.

"Clara, really, what are you doing out here with him? I would hope you knew that as my future wife, conversing with the unemployed is below you."

"I'm a bartender Pucey, not unemployed." I growled, the words leaving my mouth before I could think of there consequences. Claire only looked confused for a second, before realization set in, hardening all her pale features until she looked almost like a flawless, marble statue standing there.

"Adrian, lets leave now." she said, no longer looked at me. I wanted to reach out my hand and make her stay, explain to her the reason behind my deception. Tell her I didn't care if she was Claire or Clara, as long as she was mine. Tell her that I loved her from the moment she walked into my life and I would dedicate the rest of my living days to making her happy. I would protect and cherish her in ways a snake like Pucey never could. I wanted to tell her all those things, but something held my tongue silent.

Their silhouettes disappearing into the house left more of an impression of heartbreak on me then a thousand sad songs ever could.

*******

I don't know how long I stood outside trying to form some plan, something that would make the world right again. I didn't notice the drop in the temperature or Oliver Wood walking towards me until he was only a foot away.

"Seamus and Alicia are looking for you."

I shrugged, feeling awkward being around someone I really didn't know at a time like this.

"Alicia's worried." Oliver offered and after a few beats of silence, he furrowed his brow. "Did you hear me, Alicia's worried and you need to get back inside."

"What the hell do you care?" I snarled, wanting to be left alone.

"I could care less about you. I could care even less about Seamus for that matter. But Alicia cares about you and I'm in love with Alicia, so I'm out here freezing trying to get you back inside so she won't cry, because I hate it when she cries."

For the first time, I looked at Oliver and didn't see someone I had to put up with for Alicia's sake. I didn't see the world-renowned quidditch seeker and benefits, like coming to this party, that came with him dating my one of my best mates. I saw a man, just like me, who was helplessly in love and decided that maybe he wasn't as bad as Seamus and I liked to joke that he was.

We walked in silence back to the mansion, which was less full then when I had left it. It was as if I was sleep walking through the motions when I finally met up with Seamus and Alicia. It took me awhile to convince them that I was fine and that I didn't want to talk about it, but when I finally did, we parted ways and I went to the one place that I knew would bring me some sort of comfort, even if it went hand-in-hand with heartache.

The bar was dimly lit and empty as usual and Roger, my replacement for the night, was sleeping soundly on the couch. I couldn't help but smile at this and wonder for a moment what my life would have been like if I had taken that fateful night off. Would Davies be in the same situation as I was?

Part of me hoped the moment my muse saw him, she would have turned and walked right back out. I wanted to believe that there was something special about me. That her and I were destiny, fated against all odds to be together.

"Dean Thomas."

I whirled around, my eyes meeting hers in shock.

"Not Thomas Dean." she continued, her face still impassive.

"I..."

"It's perfectly fine."

Her impassive tone grated against my nerves and I tried inhaling deeply to cool my rising anger against the entire situation. Thinking of the way a few mere hours with her had changed my entire life, I would have liked to think I had similar effect on hers.

"And are you Claire or Clara?" I asked, taking a step towards her and lowering my voice.

For the first time since the conversation started, a hint of emotion appeared on her face. The slight flush of her cheeks, the narrowing of her eyes, all betrayed that maybe she wasn't as in control as she so obviously tried to be.

"Does it matter?"

"It does to me." I reply softly, hating myself for my weakness, for actually caring. This wasn't the way fairy tales were suppose to go. The star crossed lovers weren't suppose to met in a dingy bar, accusing each other without word.

"It's Claire." she said and I instantly noticed the lack of accent in her voice, its sweet cadence replaced by weariness.

"So your a liar too." I said, reveling in the fact that at least we were both guilty of the same sin, and somehow we could move past it.

"I may be many things Dean, but at least I'm not a no one like you." With those cruel words and tear filled eyes, she walked out of my life again, the soft tap of her heels fading into the distance, each click my hope in a happy future.

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**A/N: **Well, here is the second chapter. I hope anybody who reads it like its! :) Please R&R

**DEDICATED TO:** This story to dedicated to my beta/sister, Kate7, who is one of the greatest people I know!


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